Lead Me Home (Fight for Me #3)(113)

“Yeah. Everything looks good. CBC is good, and her O2 sats have been normal.”

Relief blew out on the heaviest sigh, and I was nodding, rubbing my face as this feeling came over me. This stunning gratitude that had taken the place of the weight that had been on my shoulders.

Was close to outweighing the amount of the love that pressed through me.

Filling me full.

He studied the readout on one of the monitors. “Has she opened her eyes yet?”

“No . . . but . . . I can feel it. She’s gonna be okay. I think she’s just sleeping off the trauma.”

It wasn’t like I was some kind of medical guru.

It was just like I’d said.

I could feel it.

He came to stand beside me, looking at Nikki.

“That’s what she needs the most. Rest.” He angled his attention to me. “And support. Someone to be there for her when she wakes up so she knows she isn’t alone.”

I shifted in the seat, tightening my hold on her hand. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“Are you finished running, Ollie?” he asked, staring at me like he was searching for the truth of my answer. Something hard in his expression.

My gaze traveled back to Nikki.

Nikki. Fucking. Walters.

The girl I’d thought the bane of my existence.

The girl nothing but a tease and a taunt of what I couldn’t have.

I’d just been too blind to recognize that she was my very existence.

“Yeah, I’m done running,” I murmured, more to her than to him.

He cracked a smile. “Good.” He gave a pat to my shoulder before he moved for the door. “Oh, and she won’t be getting those x-rays.”

I shifted in the chair so I could see him. “Why’s that?”

He paused to look back at me. “Because she’s pregnant.”





39





Nikki





My eyes fluttered open, the sound of a constant, low beep, beep, beep filling my ears. But my sight, it was filled with Ollie.

Beautiful Ollie who was staring over at me.

The man who had wrecked me.

The one who had saved me.

He’d always been an enigma.

The hardest jaw and the quickest smile.

“Nikki,” he murmured as he watched me studying him, and he reached out and set a big hand on the side of my head.

Energy flashed.

The connection so intense that I felt my insides clutch.

“Ollie.”

“You’re okay. You’re okay.”

I flinched as all the memories came flooding back.

My sister.

Sydney.

The cliffs.

“What happened?” I rasped, my throat achy and raw and my lungs too tight, but there was no stopping the panic that seized my heart. “What happened to Todd?”

So many things moved through his expression.

Hate.

Worry.

Regret.

Relief.

“He can’t hurt you anymore.”

“Oh.” It was a breath. A strike of realization. The sound of a gunshot ricocheting in my mind.

Ollie brushed his thumb over my cheek. “I’m sorry I didn’t get there sooner.”

My lips pursed, and I fought the tears that worked in my eyes. “You saved me.”

“I told you I would never let anyone hurt you again. Protecting you is my duty.”

I could feel the twist of my brow. The sorrow on my heart, and it hurt so much to say the words.

But it was time.

I couldn’t do this anymore.

Not after everything.

“I don’t want to be your duty, Ollie. I can’t be a sin you’re trying to make amends for.”

Regret streaked across Ollie’s handsome face.

Sapphire eyes flashed with intensity as he sat forward, his hold on the side of my head tightening.

Hand spread out as if he wanted to touch me everywhere.

“I’ve spent my life living in the past, Nikki.”

His voice was gruff. Strained as he seemed to struggle with the words. “I spent years searching for something that wasn’t there. It’d felt like hope. But I know now I was trying to pay a debt. That I thought I didn’t deserve to live because Sydney hadn’t.”

Grief billowed from him.

“My mom . . .” His voice broke, and my heart fisted because never in all these years had he mentioned her.

Their relationship severed.

I’d never been privy to the details.

“She blamed me,” he whispered as if it hurt too much to say it aloud. He gave a harsh shake of his head. “I’ll never forget when the police left after taking my statement, she . . . lost it.”

He gulped. “She just . . . started hammering on my chest. I’d barely been able to hear what she was saying, she was crying so hard. But I did, Nikki. She was saying that she’d trusted me . . . that it was my fault . . . that I’d promised I would take care of her. She said I failed her. Failed Sydney.”

Sympathy stretched so tight I couldn’t breathe.

“Oh, God. Ollie. I didn’t know.”

He looked at me. Laid bare. “In some way, I did fail, Nikki. We all did. We made mistakes, but none of us meant to hurt her.”